NABLUS (Ma'an) -- Israeli forces Friday closed all the stores in the village of Huwwara in the northern occupied West Bank district of Nablus, and prevented residents from the town from passing through the Beita crossroads after Palestinians allegedly threw rocks at Israeli settler vehicles on the main road.

A Ma’an reporter said that Israeli forces set up a military checkpoint at the Beita crossroads and prevented residents from exiting the village, while all shops on the Huwwara street were closed.

Israeli forces were also deployed at the main street and surrounding junctions. Huwwara’s main road connects several roads leading to nearby villages, as well as the illegal Israeli settlement of Yitzhar.

An Israeli army spokesperson told Ma’an she would look into reports.

The area around the Huwwara village is routinely closed by Israeli forces for alleged rock-throwing by mostly Palestinian teenagers from the area who target Israeli settlers traveling to and from illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank.

Israel detains hundreds of Palestinians for alleged stone-throwing every year, and Israeli rights group B'Tselem reported that from 2005 to 2010, "93 percent of the minors convicted of stone throwing were given a prison sentence, its length ranging from a few days to 20 months."

In addition to long prison sentences, Palestinians accused of stone throwing, or those accused of being affiliated with stone throwers, face arbitrary punishments in the form of road closures and the sealing of entire villages, resulting in serious economic consequences and effects on mobility.